Basic Information

 

Grade Divisions

There are four grade divisions in the Regional Fair. The MAXIMUM number of students on a single project is two, both of whom must be present for judging.

• Elementary: Grades 4 and 5
• Intermediate: Grades 6 and 7
• Junior: Grades 8 and 9
• Senior: Grades 10,11, 12

Exhibition Categories

There are six exhibition categories in the Vancouver Island Regional Science Fair:

• Engineering and Computer Sciences – The design and fabrication of useful devices or the investigation of properties of materials. Software or hardware development and application.
• Life Sciences – Aspects of life or lifestyle of non-human organism including biology, zoology and botany.
• Health Sciences – Biomedical and/or clinical aspect of human life or lifestyle and its translation into improved health for humans, or more effective health services/products. Related to human aging, genetics, cancer research, psychology, etc. Projects involving animal research that have a direct application to humans are included in this division.
• Biotechnology – the application of knowledge of biological systems to solve a problem, create a product or provide a service in one of three subject fields: crop development (agriculture, horticulture, silviculture – forestry), animal science (animals involved as pets, in agriculture, aquaculture, genetics), genomics and microbials.
• Earth & Environmental Science – Planetary processes, relationships between organisms or between an organism and its environment. Topics including ecology, geology, mineralogy, oceanography, limnology, climatology, geography, pollution, resource management.
• Physical and Mathematical Sciences – Physics, chemistry, or mathematics. May also include astronomy.

 

Project Types

There are three project types (see the judging guidelines ^[1] for each of these) :

• Experiment – Traditionally the most common type of project. Involves scientific experiment to test a specific hypothesis in which variables are controlled.
• Innovation – Involves the development and evaluation of new devices, models, techniques or approaches in fields such as technology, engineering, or computers (software and hardware).
• Study – Involves the collection and analysis of data from other sources to reveal evidence of a fact, situation, or a pattern of scientific interest.

Note: Both single-student and dual-student projects are acceptable. Participants must be aware, however, that Canada Wide Science Fair regulations permit only seven students to be sent to represent this region. The Canada Wide Science Fair ^[2]rules REQUIRE the participation of BOTH students. Should a dual project be ranked among the top exhibits, this would mean that less than the normal number of seven projects would be sent. We encourage that all projects submitted at the Grade seven level and up be single projects rather than dual projects.